Duiker W.J., Spielvogel J.J. The Essential World History. Volume 2: Since 1500
Подождите немного. Документ загружается.
placed the countries under its own rule on a wartime
basis.
Japanese leaders had hoped that their lightning strike
at American bases would destroy the U.S. Pacific fleet and
persuade President Franklin D. Roosevelt to accept Japanese
domination of the P acific. But J apan had miscalculated.
The attack on Pearl Harbor galvanized American opinion
and won broad support for Roosevelt’s war policy. The
U nited States now joined with European nations and Na-
tionalist China in a combined effort to defeat Japan and
end its hegemony in the P acific. Believing that American
inv olv ement in the Pacific would render the U nited States
ineffective in the European theater of war, Hitler declared
war on the United States four days after P earl Harbor.
The Turning Point of the War, 1942--1943
The entry of the United States into the war created a
coalition (the Grand Alliance) that ultimately defeated the
Axis Powers (Germany, Italy, and Japan). To overcome
mutual suspicions, the three major Allies, Britain, the
United States, and the Soviet Union, agreed to stress
military operations while ignoring political differences.
At the beginning of 1943, the Allies also agreed to fight
until the Axis Powers surrendered unconditionally, which
had the effect of cementing the Grand Alliance by making
it nearly impossible for Hitler to divide his foes.
Defeat, however, was far from Hitler’ s mind at the
beginning of 1942. As Japanese forces advanced into the
P acific after crippling the American naval fleet at P earl
Harbor, Hitler continued the war in Europe against Britain
and the Soviet Union. Until the fall of 1942, it appeared
that the Germans might still prevail on the battlefield.
Reinfor c ements in North Africa enabled the Afrika K orps
under General Erwin Rommel to break through the British
defenses in Egypt and advance toward Alexandria. In the
spring of 1942, a renewed German offensive in the Soviet
U nion led to the capture of the entire Crimea. But by the
fall of 1942, the war had turned against the Germans.
In North Africa, British forces had stopped Rommel’s
troops at El Alamein in the summer of 1942 and then forc ed
them back across the desert. In November 1942, British and
American forces invaded French North Africa and forced
the German and Italian troops to surrender in May 1943.
On the Eastern Front, the turning point of the war occurred
at Stalingrad. After the capture of the Crimea, Hitler de-
cided that Stalingrad, a major industrial center on the
Volga, should be taken next. Between November 1942 and
February 1943, German troops were stopped, then en-
circled, and finally forced to surrender on February 2, 1943
(see the box on p. 628). The entire German Sixth Army of
300,000 men was lost. By February 1943, German forces in
the Soviet Union were back to their positions of June 1942.
The tide of battle in the Far East also turned dramat-
ically in 1942. In the Battle of the Coral Sea on May 7--8,
1942, American naval forces stopped the Japanese advance.
On J une 4, at the Battle of Midway Island, American planes
destro yed all four of the attacking Japanese aircraft carriers
and established American naval superiority in the Pacific.
By the fall of 1942, Allied forces were beginning to gather
for offensive operations: into South China from Burma,
through the East Indies by a process of ‘‘island hopping’’ by
troops commanded by the U .S. general Douglas Mac-
Arthur , and across the P acific with a combination of U .S.
Army, Marine, and Navy attacks on Japanese-held islands.
After a series of bitter engagements in the waters of the
Solomon Islands from A ugust to Nov ember 1942, Japanese
fortunes began to fade.
The Last Years of the War
By the beginning of 1943, the tide of battle had turned
against Germany, Italy, and Japan. After the Axis forces had
German Troops in the S oviet Union. At first, the German attack
on the Soviet Union was enormously successful, leading one German
general to remark in his diary, ‘‘It is probably no overstatement to say
that the Russian campaign has been won in the space of two weeks.’’ This
picture shows German troops firing on Soviet positions.
c
Artmedia/HIP/The Image Works
626 CHAPTER 25 THE CRISIS DEEPENS: WORLD WAR II
surrendered in Tunisia on May 13, 1943, the Allies crossed
the Mediterranean and carried the war to Italy. After taking
Sicily, Allied troops began the invasion of mainland Italy in
September. In the meantime, after the ouster and arrest of
Benito M ussolini, a new Italian government offered to
surrender to Allied forces. But Mussolini was liberated by
the Germans in a daring raid and then set up as the head of
a puppet German state in northern Italy while German
troops moved in and occupied much of Italy. The new
defensive lines established by the Germans in the hills
south of Rome were so effective that the Allied advance up
the Italian peninsula was a painstaking affair accompanied
by heavy casualties. Rome did not fall to the Allies until
J une 4, 1944. By that time, the Italian war had assumed a
secondary role anywa y as the Allies opened their long-
awaited ‘‘second front ’’ in western Europe.
Under the direction of the American general Dwight
D. Eisenhower (1890--1969), the Allies landed five assault
A
A
A
l
l
l
l
e
e
e
u
u
u
t
t
t
i
i
a
a
n
n
I
I
I
s
s
s
l
l
l
l
a
a
a
n
n
n
d
d
d
s
s
A
LA
S
K
A
M
MAN
N
N
N
N
N
M
M
N
CHU
KUO
M
(MA
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
NCH
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
URI
A)
)
)
A)
)
K
Ka
Ka
a
am
a
a
cha
a
a
a
a
a
a
tk
tka
tka
tk
tk
tk
t
a
a
a
a
a
tk
tk
tk
tk
t
a
a
a
a
IW
IWO
I
JIMA
O
O
O
O
O
MID
MID
WAY
W
HAW
HA
H
A
II
A
N
IS
IS
SL
I
AND
S
G
GU
GUA
UA
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
DAL
DA
CANAL
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
G
DA
TIN
IAN
A
OK
O
KI
KI
NAW
A
K
O
OK
OK
WA
W
A
WA
W
W
AW
W
W
AW
AW
ATT
TT
U
U
TU
S
o
l
omo
n
Isl
Isl
Is
I
and
a
s
Mar
ar
sha
h
sha
ll
ll
ll
I
Isl
Isl
and
and
s
s
s
S
S
Sa
ai
p
an
Gua
m
Gua
Bon
B
in Islands
in
n
n
i
in
Mariana Is
l
an
ds
Kur
Kur
ur
ile
ile
ile
Is
Is
lan
lan
n
d
d
ds
ds
land
Ryu
Ryu
yu
R
R
k
ku
ku
Isl
and
nd
d
d
s
s
s
R
R
R
R
Car
oli
li
n
ne
ne
e
Isl
Isl
Isl
Is
and
an
a
s
Sa
Sak
Sa
Sa
Sa
Sak
Sa
h
ha
hal
in
Sa
Sa
Sa
Sa
Sa
Paci
f
ic
O
cea
n
I
n
d
ia
n
O
cea
n
Cora
l
S
e
a
SO
VIET
U
NI
ON
IND
D
D
D
D
IA
D
D
D
D
D
BUR
MA
MA
MA
A
A
MA
A
MA
MA
BU
BUR
A
A
U
THA
THA
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
TH
A
A
A
I
I
I
ILA
I
I
I
ND
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
D
ND
D
FRE
N
N
NCH
H
NCH
H
N
H
N
H
N
N
H
N
N
N
N
H
H
H
N
H
N
N
N
H
H
H
N
N
H
H
H
H
N
NC
N
N
NC
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
NC
NC
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
FRE
FRE
CH
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
IN
INA
A
A
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
IN
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
IND
I
I
I
I
OC
DOC
A
U
S
TRALI
A
PH
P
H
PHI
PHI
I
H
H
PH
H
H
PH
PH
H
H
P
P
L
LIP
PIN
E
PH
P
H
PH
H
H
PH
H
PH
PH
H
H
P
P
P
P
SL
ISL
ISL
L
ISL
ISL
ISL
SL
IS
ISL
ISL
ISL
S
ISL
ISL
IS
ISL
SL
S
ISL
L
IS
IS
ISL
IS
S
ISL
ISL
L
S
S
IS
S
I
S
A
AND
A
A
S
ISL
IS
IS
IS
IS
IS
IS
I
IS
S
S
IS
IS
S
S
IS
IS
S
S
S
ISL
IS
IS
IS
S
IS
IS
I
IS
I
IS
I
I
L
L
L
L
L
L
L
L
L
L
L
L
L
L
L
L
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
KOR
KOR
OR
KOR
KOR
KO
KOR
KOR
KOR
KOR
R
KOR
KO
KOR
R
KOR
R
OR
O
KO
OR
O
KO
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
EA
EA
A
A
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
KOR
KOR
KOR
KO
R
KOR
KOR
OR
KOR
KOR
KO
R
R
KOR
OR
K
KO
KO
KO
KO
K
KO
O
O
O
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
MONGOLIA
C
HINA
CANADA
J
JAP
JAP
P
P
P
P
AP
P
AP
AP
P
P
AP
P
P
P
A
P
A
A
A
A
A
AN
AN
N
N
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
AP
P
AP
AP
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
P
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
MAL
A
A
A
AL
AL
AL
L
L
MAL
A
A
A
M
A
L
A
L
L
A
L
A
A
A
A
A
AY
YA
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
AL
A
A
A
AL
AL
AL
AL
L
A
A
L
L
A
L
L
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
ALAY
AL
L
L
L
L
L
A
AYA
L
L
L
L
L
ALAY
B
BOR
B
B
B
B
B
B
B
B
B
B
B
B
B
B
B
B
B
NEO
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
B
B
B
B
B
B
B
B
B
B
B
B
B
B
B
B
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
O
D
D
D
D
U
U
U
U
T
T
T
C
C
C
C
H
H
H
H
E
E
E
A
A
S
S
T
T
I
I
I
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
N
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
D
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
E
E
E
E
S
S
S
T
To
Tok
ky
ky
T
T
T
T
T
T
T
T
T
T
T
T
T
T
o
T
T
T
T
T
T
T
T
T
T
T
T
T
T
Naga
aga
ga
saki
i
saki
i
ki
ki
i
ki
ki
k
i
ki
k
ki
ki
k
i
k
k
ki
ki
k
s
i
ki
i
i
ki
i
i
ki
ki
ki
ki
ki
ki
i
ki
ki
ki
ki
ki
k
ki
ki
ki
i
i
ki
i
i
k
i
Hi
iro
Hi
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
Hi
i
sh
him
h
h
h
h
h
h
h
h
h
h
h
h
h
a
a
a
a
a
a
Hi
ir
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
i
Hi
i
sh
h
h
h
h
h
h
h
h
h
h
h
h
h
h
a
a
a
a
a
a
Chun
gkin
in
n
n
n
n
n
in
g
in
N
an
ji
n
g
Sing
in
Sin
S
S
Sin
Sin
Sing
in
Sin
Sing
S
S
Si
Sing
Sin
Sin
S
n
Sin
S
i
Sin
Sing
S
i
ng
Sin
i
apor
or
or
or
r
or
r
r
r
r
or
or
r
r
r
r
r
r
r
r
e
e
e
e
e
e
or
o
o
o
o
Si
S
S
S
Si
S
S
S
Si
Si
Si
S
Si
S
S
Si
S
S
S
S
Si
i
S
i
i
i
r
r
r
r
r
r
r
r
r
r
r
r
r
e
e
e
e
or
or
r
r
r
r
r
r
r
r
r
r
r
r
r
r
r
ng
ng
ng
n
n
ng
n
ng
ng
n
g
g
g
or
or
r
r
or
or
r
or
r
r
or
r
r
or
r
r
r
r
r
e
e
e
e
e
e
Hon
Hon
n
Hon
H
Hong
n
H
Hon
H
H
Hon
H
n
Hong
Hon
Hon
Hon
H
H
H
H
Hon
Hon
n
n
Hon
Hong
n
H
H
Hon
Hon
Hon
n
Hon
Hon
H
H
H
on
Kon
Kong
K
K
Kong
K
ong
K
K
K
K
K
Pea
Pear
ar
l
l
l
Harb
or
or
r
Anchorage
0
5
00 1,000 Miles
0 500 1
,00
0 1
,50
0 Kilo
m
me
et
et
e
e
ers
e
e
e
e
e
e
e
e
e
Allied powers and areas
under Allied control
Japanese Empire, 1937
Japanese conquests, 1937–1944
Japanese satellite areas, 1941
Farthest Japanese advance
Allied offensives, 1942–1945
Japanese offensives, 1942–1945
Main bombing routes
Naval battles
World War II: Asia and the Pacific
MAP 25.2 Wo rld War II in Asia and the Pacific. In 1937, Japan invaded northern China,
beginning its effort to create a ‘‘Great East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere.’’ Further expansion led
the United States to end iron and oil sales to Japan. Deciding that war with the United States
was inevitable, Japan engineered a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor.
Q
Wh y was control of the islands in the western P acific of great importance both to the
Japanese and to the Allies?
View an animated version of this map or related maps at www.cengage.com/history/
duikspiel/essentialworld6e
WORLD WAR II 627
divisions on the beaches of Normandy on June 6 in his-
tory’s greatest naval invasion. An initially indecisive
German response enabled the Allied forces to establish a
beachhead. Within three months, they had landed two
million men and a half-million vehicles that pushed in-
land and broke through German defensive lines.
After the breakout, Allied troops moved south and
east and liberated Paris by the end of August. By March
1945, they had crossed the Rhine River and advanced
deep into Germany. At the end of April 1945, Allied ar-
mies in northern Germany moved toward the Elbe River,
where they finally linked up with the Soviets. The Soviets
had come a long way since the Battle of Stalingrad in
1943. In the summer of 1943, German forces were
soundly defeated by the Soviets at the Battle of Kursk
(July 5--12), the greatest tank battle of World War II.
Soviet forces now began a relentless advance westward.
The Soviets had reoccupied Ukraine by the end of 1943
and lifted the siege of Leningrad and moved into the
Baltic states by the beginning of 1944. Advancing along a
northern front, Soviet troops occupied Warsaw in Janu-
ary 1945 and entered Berlin in April. Meanwhile, Soviet
troops along a southern front swept through Hungary,
Romania, and Bulgaria.
In January 1945, Hitler had moved into a bunker 55
feet under Berlin to direct the final stages of the war. In
his final political testament, Hitler, consistent to the end
in his rabid anti-Semitism, blamed the Jews for the war.
Hitler committed suicide on April 30, two days after
Mussolini had been shot by partisan Italian forces.
AGERMAN SOLDIER AT STALINGRAD
The Soviet victory at Stalingrad was a major turning
point in World War II. This excerpt comes from the
diary of a German soldier who fought and died in
the Battle of Stalingrad. His dreams of victory and
a return home with medals were soon dashed by the realities
of Soviet resistance.
Diary of a German Soldier
Today, after we’d had a bath, the company commander told us that if
our future operations are as successful, we’ll soon reach the Volga,
take Stalingrad, and then the war will inevitably soon be over. Perhaps
we’ll be home by Christmas.
July 29. The company commander says the Russian troops are
completely broken, and cannot hold out any longer. To reach the
Volga and take Stalingrad is not so difficult for us. The F
€
uhrer knows
where the Russians’ weak point is. Victory is not far away. ...
August 10. The F€uhrer’s orders were read out to us. He expects
victor y of us. We are all convinced that they can’t stop us.
August 12. This morning outstanding soldiers were presented with
decorations. ... W ill I really go back to Elsa without a decoration?
I believe that for Stalingrad the F
€
uhrer will decorate even me. ...
September 4. We are being sent northward along the front to-
ward Stalingrad. We marched all night and by dawn had reached
Voroponovo Station. We can already see the smoking town. It’s a
happy thought that the end of the war is getting nearer. That’s what
everyone is saying. ...
September 8. Two days of nonstop fighting. The Russians are
defending themselves with insane stubbornness. Our regiment has
lost many men. ...
September 16. Our battalion, plus tanks, is attacking the [grain
storage] elevator, from which smoke is pouring---the grain in it is
burning; the Russians seem to have set light to it themselves. Barba-
rism. The battalion is suffering heavy losses. ...
October 10. The Russians are so close to us that our planes
cannot bomb them. We are preparing for a decisive attack. The
F
€
uhrer has ordered the whole of Stalingrad to be taken as rapidly as
possible. ...
October 22. Our regiment has failed to break into the factory.
We have lost many men; ever y time you move you have to jump
over bodies. ...
November 10. A letter from Elsa today. Everyone expects us
home for Christmas. In Germany everyone believes we already hold
Stalingrad. How wrong they are. If they could only see what Stalin-
grad has done to our army. ...
November 21. The Russians have gone over to the offensive
along the whole front. Fierce fighting is going on. So, there it is---the
Volga, victory, and soon home to our families! We shall obviously
be seeing them next in the other world.
November 29. We are encircled. It was announced this morning
that the F
€
uhrer has said: ‘‘The army can trust me to do everything
necessary to ensure supplies and rapidly break the encirclement.’’
December 3. We are on hunger rations and waiting for the res-
cue that the F
€
uhrer promised. ...
December 14. Everybody is racked with hunger. Frozen potatoes
are the best meal, but to get them out of the ice-covered ground
under fire from Russian bullets is not so easy. ...
December 26. The horses have already been eaten. I would eat a
cat; they say its meat is also tasty. The soldiers look like corpses or
lunatics, looking for something to put in their mouths. They no
longer take cover from Russian shells; they haven’t the strength to
walk, run away, and hide. A curse on this war!
Q
What did this soldier believe about the F
€
uhrer? Why?
What was the source of his information? Why is the battle for
Stalingrad considered a major turning point in World War II?
628 CHAPTER 25 THE CRISIS DEEPENS: WORLD WAR II
On May 7, German commanders surrendered. The war in
Europe was over.
Allied war plans for Asia had originally called for a
massive military advance on the Japanese home islands
through China, making full use of the latent strength of
Chiang Kai-shek’s armed forces. By 1943, however, Pres-
ident Roosevelt had lost confidence in the ability of
Chiang Kai-shek’s government to play a positive role in
Allied operations and had turned to a ‘‘Pacific strategy’’
based on a gradual advance by U.S. military forces across
the Pacific Ocean. Beginning in 1943, American forces
had gone on the offensive and proceeded, slowly at times,
across the Pacific. The Americans took an increasing toll
of enemy resources, especially at sea and in the air. As
Allied military power drew inexorably closer to the main
Japanese islands in the first months of 1945, President
Harry Truman, who had succeeded to the presidency on
the death of Franklin Roosevelt in April, decided to use
atomic weapons to bring the war to an end without the
necessity of an Allied invasion of the Japanese homeland.
The first bomb was dropped on the city of Hiroshima on
August 6. Three days later, a second bomb was dropped
on Nagasaki. Japan surrendered unconditionally on
August 14. World War II was finally over.
The New Order
Q
Focus Question: What was the nature of the new
orders that Germany and Japan attempted to establish
in the territories they occupied?
The initial victories of the Germans and the Japanese had
given them the opportunity to restructure society in
Europe and Asia. Both followed policies of ruthless
domination of their subject peoples.
The New Order in Europe
In 1942, the Nazi empire stretched across continental
Europe from the English Channel in the west to the
outskirts of Moscow in the east. Nazi-occupied Europe
was largely organized in one of two ways. Some areas,
such as western Poland, were directly annexed by Nazi
Germany and made into German provinces. Most of
occupied Europe was administered by German military or
civilian officials, combined with different degrees of in-
direct control from collaborationist regimes.
Because the conquered lands in the east contained the
living space for German expansion and were, in Nazi eyes,
populated by racially inferior Slavic peoples, Nazi ad-
ministration there was considerably more ruthless. Soon
after the conquest of Poland, Heinrich Himmler, the
leader of the SS, was put in charge of German resettlement
plans in the east. Himmler’s task was to evacuate the in-
ferior Slavic peoples and replace them with Germans, a
policy first applied to the new German provinces created
from the lands of western Poland. One million Poles were
uprooted and dumped in southern Poland. Hundreds of
thousands of ethnic Germans (descendants of Germans
who had migrated years earlier from Germany to different
parts of southern and eastern Europe) were encouraged to
colonize the designated areas in Poland. By 1942, two
million ethnic Germans had been settled in Poland.
Labor shortages in Germany led to a policy of
ruthless mobilization of foreign labor for Germany. In
1942, a special office was created to recruit labor for
German farms and industries. By the summer of 1944,
seven million foreign workers were laboring in Germany
where they constituted 20 percent of the labor force. At
the same time, another seven million workers were sup-
plying forced labor in their own countries on farms, in
industries, and even in military camps. The brutality of
Germany’s recruitment policies often led more and more
people to resist the Nazi occupation forces.
The Holocaust
No aspect of the Nazi new order was more terrifying than
the deliberate attempt to exterminate the Jews of E urope.
CHRONOLOGY
The Course of World War II
Germany and the Soviet Union divide
Poland
September 28, 1939
Blitzkrieg against Denmark and Norway April 1940
Blitzkrieg against Belgium, Netherlands,
and France
May 1940
France surrenders June 22, 1940
Battle of Britain Fall 1940
Nazi seizure of Yugoslavia and Greece April 1941
Germany invades the Soviet Union June 22, 1941
Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor December 7, 1941
Battle of the Coral Sea May 7--8, 1942
Battle of Midway Island June 4, 1942
Allied invasion of North Africa November 1942
German surrender at Stalingrad February 2, 1943
Axis forces surrender in North Africa May 1943
Battle of Kursk July 5--12, 1943
Invasion of mainland Italy September 1943
Allied invasion of France June 6, 1944
Hitler commits suicide April 30, 1945
Germany surrenders May 7, 1945
Atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima August 6, 1945
Japan surrenders August 14, 1945
T
HE NEW ORDER 629
Racial struggle was a key element in Hitler’s ideology and
meant to him a clearly defined conflict of opposites: the
Aryans, creators of human cultural development, against
the Jews, parasites who were trying to destroy the Aryans.
Himmler and the SS organization closely shared Hitler’s
racial ideology. The SS was given responsibility for what the
N azis called their Final Solution to the ‘‘Jewish problem’’---
annihilation of the Jews. After the defeat of Poland, the SS
ordered special strike forces (Einsatzgruppen) to round up
all P olish Jews and c oncentrate them in ghettos established
in a number of P olish cities.
In June 1941, the Einsatzgruppen were given new
responsibilities as mobile killing units. These SS death
squads followed the regular army’s advance into Russia.
Their job was to round up Jews in their villages, execute
them, and bury them in mass graves, often giant pits dug
by the victims themselves before they were shot. But the
constant killing led to morale problems among the SS
executioners. During a visit to Minsk in the Soviet Union,
Himmler tried to build morale by pointing out that he
‘‘would not like it if Germans did such a thing gladly. But
their conscience was in no way impaired, for they were
soldiers who had to carry out every order uncondition-
ally. He alone had responsibility before God and Hitler
for everything that was happening.’’
6
Although it has been estimated that as many as one
million Jews were killed by the Einsatzgruppen, this ap-
proach to solving the Jewish problem was soon perceived
as inadequate. Instead, the Nazis opted for the systematic
annihilation of the European Jewish population in spe-
cially built death camps. Jews from countries occupied by
Germany (or sympathetic to Germany) were rounded up,
packed like cattle into freight trains, and shipped to
Poland, where six extermination centers were built to
dispose of them. The largest and most famous was
Auschwitz-Birkenau. Medical technicians chose Zyklon B
(the commercial name for hydrogen cyanide) as the most
effective gas for quickly killing large numbers of people in
gas chambers designed to look like ‘‘shower rooms’’ to
facilitate the cooperation of the victims. After gassing, the
corpses were burned in specially built crematoria.
The death camps were in operation by the spring of
1942; by the summer, Jews were also being shipped from
France, Belgium, and the Netherlands. Even as the Allies
were making significant advances in 1944, Jews were
being shipped from Greece and Hungary. A harrowing
experience awaited the Jews when they arrived at one of
the six death camps. Rudolf H
€
oss, commandant at
Auschwitz-Birkenau, described it:
We had two SS doctors on duty at Auschwitz to examine the
incoming transports of prisoners. The prisoners would be
marched by one of the doctors who would make spot deci-
sions as they walked by. Those who were fit for work were
sent into the camp. Others were sent immediately to the ex-
termination plants. Children of tender years were invariably
exterminated since by reason of their youth they were unable
to work. ... At Auschwitz we endeavored to fool the victims
into thinking that they were to go through a delousing pro-
cess. Of course, frequently they realized our true intentions
and we sometimes had riots and difficulties due to that fact.
7
About 30 percent of the arrivals at Auschwitz were sent to
a labor camp; the remainder went to the gas chambers
(see the box on p. 633). After they had been gassed, the
bodies were burned in the crematoria. The victims’ goods
and even their bodies were used for economic gain.
Female hair was cut off, collected, and turned into cloth
The Ho locaust: Activities of t he Einsatzgruppen. The mobile
killing units known as the Einsatzgruppen were active during the first
phase of mass killings of the Holocaust. This picture shows the execution
of a Jew by a member of one of these SS killing squads. Onlookers include
members of the German army, the German Labor Service, and even
Hitler Youth. When it became apparent that this method of killing was
inefficient, it was replaced by the death camps.
Library of Congress (2391, folder 401)
630 CHAPTER 25 THE CRISIS DEEPENS: WORLD WAR II
or used to stuff mattresses. The Germans killed between
five and six million Jews, more than three million of them
in the death camps. Virtually 90 percent of the Jewish
populations of Poland, the Baltic countries, and Germany
were exterminated.
The Nazis were also responsible for another
Holocaust, the death by shooting, starvation, or over-
work of at least another 9 to 10 million people. Because
the Nazis considered the Gypsies of Europe a race con-
taining alien blood (like the Jews), they were systemati-
cally rounded up for extermination. About 40 percent of
Europe’s one million Gypsies were killed in the death
camps. The leading elements of the ‘‘subhuman’’ Slavic
peoples---the clergy, intelligentsia, civil leaders, judges,
and lawyers---were arrested and deliberately killed. Prob-
ably an additional four million Poles, Ukrainians, and
Byelorussians lost their lives as slave laborers for Nazi
Germany. Finally, at least three million Soviet prisoners of
war, and probably more, were killed in captivity.
The New Order in Asia
Once Japan’s takeover was completed, Japanese war policy
in the occupied areas in Asia became essentially defensive,
as Japan hoped to use its new possessions to meet
its needs for raw materials, such as tin, oil, and rubber,
as well as to serve as an outlet for Japanese manufactured
goods. To provide a structure for the arrangement,
Japanese leaders set up the Greater East Asia Co-
Prosperity Sphere as a self-sufficient community designed
to provide mutual benefits to the occupied areas and the
home country.
The Japanese conquest of Southeast Asia had been
accomplished under the slogan ‘‘Asia for the Asians.’’
Japanese officials in occupied territories quickly promised
that independent governments would be established un-
der Japanese tutelage. Such governments were eventually
established in Burma, the Dutch East Indies, Vietnam,
and the Philippines.
In fact, however, real power rested with the Japanese
military authorities in each territory, and the local Japa-
nese military command was directly subordinated to the
army general staff in Tokyo. The economic resources of
the colonies were exploited for the benefit of the Japanese
war machine, while natives were recruited to serve in local
military units or conscripted to work on public works
projects. In some cases, the people living in the occupied
areas were subjected to severe hardships. In Indochina,
for example, forced requisitions of rice by the local
Japanese authorities for shipment abroad created a food
shortage that caused the starvation of more than a million
Vietnamese in 1944 and 1945.
At first, many Southeast Asian nationalists took
Japanese promises at face value and agreed to cooperate
with their new masters. But as the exploitative nature of
Japanese occupation policies became clear, sentiment
turned against the new order. Japanese officials some-
times unwittingly provoked such attitudes by their arro-
gance and contempt for local customs.
Japanese military planners had little respect for their
subject peoples and viewed the Geneva Convention on
the laws of war as little more than a fabrication of
Western countries to tie the hands of their adversaries. In
conquering northern and central China, the Japanese
freely used poison gas and biological weapons, which
caused the deaths of millions of Chinese citizens. The
Japanese occupation of the onetime Chinese capital of
Nanjing was especially brutal. In the notorious ‘‘Nanjing
Incident,’’ they spent several days killing, raping, and
looting the local population.
Japanese soldiers also treated Koreans savagely. Al-
most 800,000 Koreans were sent overseas, most of them as
forced laborers, to Japan. Tens of thousands of women
from Korea and the Philippines were forced to be
‘‘comfort women’’ (prostitutes) for Japanese troops. In
construction projects to help their war effort, the Japanese
also made extensive use of labor forces composed of
both prisoners of war and local peoples. In building the
Burma-Thailand railway in 1943, for example, the
Japanese used 61,000 Australian, British, and Dutch
prisoners of war and almost 300,000 workers from
Burma, Malaya, Thailand, and the Dutch East Indies. By
the time the railway was completed, 12,000 Allied pris-
oners of war and 90,000 native workers had died as a
result of the inadequate diet and appalling work con-
ditions in an unhealthy climate.
The Home Front
Q
Focus Question: What were conditions like on the
home front for the major belligerents in World War II?
World War II was even more of a total war than World War I.
Fighting was much more widespread and cover ed most of
the world. The number of civilians killed was far higher.
Mobilizing the People: Three Examples
The initial defeats of the Soviet Union led to drastic
emergency mobilization measures that affected the civil-
ian population. Leningrad, for example, experienced nine
hundred days of siege, during which its inhabitants became
so desperate for food that they ate dogs, cats, and mice.
THE HOME FRO NT 631
As the German army made its rapid advance into Soviet
territory, the factories in the western part of the Soviet
Union were dismantled and shipped to the interior---to
the Urals, western Siberia, and the Volga region. Machines
were set down on the bare earth, and walls went up
around them as workers began their work.
Stalin calle d the widespread military and industrial
mobilization of the nation a ‘‘battle of machines,’’ and
the Soviets won, producing 78,000 tanks and 98,000
artillery pieces. In 1943, fully 55 percent of Soviet na-
tional income wen t for war mat
eriel, compared to 15
percent in 1940 (see the comparative essay ‘‘Paths to
Modernization’’ on p. 634).
Soviet women played a major role in the war effort.
Women and girls were enlisted for work in industries,
mines, and railroads. Overall the number of women
FILM & HISTORY
E
UROPA,EUROPA (1990)
Directed by Agnieszka Holland, Europa, Europa (known as Hitler-
junge Salomon [Hitler Youth Salomon] in Germany) is the harrow-
ing story of one Jewish boy’s escape from the horrors of Nazi
persecution. It is based on the memoirs of Salomon Perel, a German
Jew of Polish background who survived by pretending to be a pure
Aryan. The film begins in 1938 during Kristallnacht when the family
of Solly (Perel’s nickname) is attacked in their hometown of Peine,
Germany. Solly’s sister is killed, and the family moves back to
Poland. When the Nazis invade Poland, Solly (Marco Hofschneider)
and his brother are sent east, but the brothers become separated and
Solly is placed in a Soviet orphanage in Grodno in the eastern part
of Poland occupied by the Soviets.
For two years, Solly becomes a dedicated Communist youth,
but when the Germans invade in 1941, he falls into their hands and
quickly assumes a new identity in order to survive. He becomes
Josef ‘‘Jupp’’ Peters, supposedly the son of German parents from
Latvia. Fluent in both Russian and German, Solly/Jupp becomes a
translator for the German forces. After an unintended act of bra-
vado, he is rewarded by being sent to a Hitler Youth school where
he lives in fear of being exposed as a Jew because of his circumcised
penis. He manages to survive the downfall of Nazi Germany and at
the end of the war makes his way with his brother, who has also
survived, to Palestine. Throughout much of the movie, Solly/Jupp
lives in constant fear that his true identity as a Jew will be recog-
nized, but his luck, charm, and resourcefulness enable him to sur-
vive a series of extraordinary events.
Although there is no way of knowing if each detail of this
movie is historically accurate (and some are clearly inaccurate, such
as a bombing run by a plane that was not developed until after the
war), overall the story has the ring of truth. The fanaticism of both
the Soviet and the Nazi officials who indoctrinate young people
seems real. The scene in the Hitler Youth school on how to identify
a Jew is realistic, even when it is made ironic by the instructor’s
choice of Solly/Jupp to demonstrate the characteristics of a true
Aryan. The movie also realistically portrays the fearful world in
which Jews had to live under the Nazis before the war and the hor-
rible conditions of the Jewish ghettos in Polish cities during the war.
The film shows how people had to fight for their survival in a world
of ideological madness, when Jews were killed simply for being Jews.
The attitudes of the German soldiers also seem real. Many are
shown following orders and killing Jews based on the beliefs in
which they have been indoctrinated. But the movie also portrays
some German soldiers whose humanity did not allow them to kill
Jews. One homosexual soldier discovers that Solly/Jupp is a Jew
when he tries---unsuccessfully---to have sex with him. The soldier
then becomes the boy’s protector until he himself is killed in battle.
Many movies have been made about the horrible experiences of
Jews during World War II, but this one is quite different from most
of them. It might never have been made except for the fact that Salo-
mon Perel, who was told by his brother not to tell his story because
no one would believe it, was inspired to write his memoirs after a
1985 reunion with his former Hitler Youth group leader. This pas-
sionate and intelligent film is ultimately a result of that encounter.
Salomon Perel/Josef Peters (Marco Hofschneider) as a Hitler
Youth member
Les Films Du Losange/CCC Filmkunst/The Kobal Collection
632 CHAPTER 25 THE CRISIS DEEPENS: WORLD WAR II
working in industry increased almost 60 percent. Soviet
women were also expected to dig antitank ditches
and work as air raid wardens. In addition, the Soviet
Union was the only country in World War II to use
women as combatants. Soviet women functioned as
snipers and as crews in bomber squadrons.
In August 1914, Germans had enthusiastically
cheered their soldiers marching off to war; in September
1939, the streets were quiet. Many Germans were apa-
thetic or, even worse for the Nazi regime, had a fore-
boding of disaster. Hitler was very aware of the
importance of the home front. He believed that the col-
lapse of the home front in World War I had caused
Germany’s defeat. To avoid a repetition of that experience,
he adopted economic policies that may indeed have cost
Germany the war.
To maintain the morale of the home front during
the first two years of the war, Hitler refused to cut
production of consumer goods or increas e the
production of armaments. After German defeats on the
Russian front and the American entry into the war,
however, th e situati on changed. Early in 1942, Hitler
finally ordered a massive increase in armaments pro-
duction and the siz e of the army. Hitler’s architect, Al-
bert Speer, was made minister for armaments and
munitions in 1942. By eliminating waste and rational-
izing procedures. Spee r was able to triple the production
of armaments bet ween 1942 and 1943, desp ite the in-
tense Allied air raids. Speer’s urgent plea for a total
mobilization of resources for the war effort went un-
heeded, however. Hitler, fearful of civilian morale
problems that would undermine the home front, ref used
any dramati c cuts in t he production of consumer goods.
A total mobilization of the economy was not im-
plemented until 1944, but by that time, it was too late.
The war produced a reversal in Nazi attitudes toward
women. Nazi resistance to female employment declined
as the war progressed and more and more men were
THE HOLOCAUST:THE CAMP COMMANDANT AND THE C AMP VICTIMS
The systematic annihilation of millions of men,
women, and children in extermination camps
makes the Holocaust one of the most horrifying
events in history. The first document is taken from
an account by Rudolf H
€
oss, commandant of the extermination
camp at Auschwitz-Birkenau. In the second document, a French
doctor explains what happened at one of the crematoria de-
scribed by H
€
oss.
Commandant H
€
oss Describes the Equipment
The two large crematoria, Nos. I and II, were built during the winter
of 1942--43. ... Each ...could cremate c. 2,000 corpses within
twenty-four hours. ... Crematoria I and II both had underground
undressing and gassing rooms which could be completely ventilated.
The corpses were brought up to the ovens on the floor above by lift.
The gas chambers could hold c. 3,000 people.
The firm of Topf had calculated that the two smaller cremato-
ria, III and IV, would each be able to cremate 1,500 corpses within
twenty-four hours. However, owing to the wartime shortage of
materials, the builders were obliged to economize, and so the
undressing rooms and gassing rooms were built above ground and
the ovens were of a less solid construction. But it soon became ap-
parent that the flimsy construction of these two four-retort ovens
was not up to the demands made on it. No. III ceased operating al-
together after a short time and later was no longer used. No. IV had
to be repeatedly shut down since after a short period in operation
of 4--6 weeks, the ovens and chimneys had burnt out. The victims
of the gassing were mainly burnt in pits behind crematorium IV.
The largest number of people gassed and cremated within
twenty-four hours was somewhat over 9,000.
A French Doctor Describes the Victims
It is mid-day, when a long line of women, children, and old people
enter the yard. The senior official in charge ...climbs on a bench to
tell them that they are going to have a bath and that afterward they
will get a drink of hot coffee. They all undress in the yard. ... The
doors are opened and an indescribable jostling begins. The first peo-
ple to enter the gas chamber begin to draw back. They sense the
death which awaits them. The SS men put an end to this pushing
and shoving wi th blows from their rifle butts beating the heads of
the horrified women who are desperately hugging their children.
The massive oak double doors are shut. For two endless minutes
one can hear banging on the walls and screams which are no longer
human. And then---not a sound. Five minutes later the doors are
opened. The corpses, squashed together and distorted, fall out like a
waterfall. ... The bodies, which are still warm, pass through the
hands of the hairdresser, who cuts their hair, and the dentist, who
pulls out their gold teeth. ... One more transport has just been pro-
cessed through No. IV crematorium.
Q
What ‘‘equipment’’ does H
€
oss describe? What process
does the French doctor describe? Is there any sympathy for the
victims in either account? Why or why not? How could such a
horrifying process have been allowed to occur? Who was held
responsible after the war? Was this sufficient?
THE HOME FRO NT 633
called up for military service. Nazi magazines now pro-
claimed, ‘‘We see the woman as the eternal mother of our
people, but also as the working and fighting comrade of
the man.’’
8
But the number of women working in in-
dustry, agriculture, commerce, and domestic service in-
creased only slightly. The total number of employed
women in September 1944 was 14.9 million, compared
with 14.6 million in May 1939. Many women, especially
those of the middle class, resisted regular employment,
particularly in factories.
Wartime Japan was a highly mobilized society. To
guarantee its control over all national resources, the gov-
ernment set up a planning board to control prices, wages,
the utilization of labor, and the allocation of resources.
COMPARATIVE ESSAY
P
ATHS TO MODERNIZATION
To the casual observer, the most important feature
of the first half of the twentieth century was the
rise of a virulent form of competitive nationalism
that began in Europe and ultimately descended
into the cauldron of two destructive world wars. Behind the
scenes, however, the leading countries were also engaging in
another form of competition over the most effective path to
modernization.
The traditional approach, fostered by an independent urban mer-
chant class, had been adopted by Great Britain, France, and the
United States and led to the emergence of democratic societies on
the capitalist model. A second approach, adopted in the late nine-
teenth century by imperial Germany and Meiji Japan, was carried
out by traditional elites in the absence of a strong independent
bourgeois class. They relied on strong government intervention to
promote the growth of national wealth and power and led ultimately
to the formation of fascist and militarist regimes during the depres-
sion years of the early 1930s.
The third approach, selected by Vladimir Lenin after the
Bolshevik Revolution in 1917, was designed to carry out an indus-
trial revolution without going through an intermediate capitalist
stage. Guided by the Communist Party in the almost total absence
of an urban middle class, this approach envisaged the creation of an
advanced industrial society by destroying the concept of private
property. Although Lenin’s plans ultimately called for the ‘‘withering
of the state,’’ the party adopted totalitarian methods to eliminate en-
emies of the revolution and carry out the changes needed to create a
future classless utopia.
How did these various approaches contribute to the series of
crises that afflicted the world during the first half of the twentieth
century? The democratic-capitalist approach proved to be a consid-
erable success in an economic sense, leading to the creation of ad-
vanced economies that could produce manufactured goods at a rate
never seen before. Societies just beginning to undergo their own
industrial revolutions tried to imitate the success of the capitalist
nations by carrying out their own ‘‘revolutions from above’’ in
Germany and Japan. But the Great Depression and competition over
resources and markets soon led to an intense rivalry between the
established capitalist states and their ambitious late arrivals, a rivalry
that ultimately erupted into global conflict.
In the first decade of the twentieth century, imperial Russia
appeared ready to launch its own bid to join the ranks of the indus-
trialized nations. But that effort was derailed by its entry into World
War I, and before that conflict had come to an end, the Bolsheviks
were in power. Isolated from the capitalist marketplace by mutual
consent, the Soviet Union was able to avoid being dragged into the
Great Depression but, despite Stalin’s efforts, was unsuccessful in
staying out of the ‘‘battle of imperialists’’ that followed at the end of
the 1930s. As World War II came to an end, the stage was set for a
battle of the victors---the United States and the Soviet Union---over
political and ideological supremacy.
Q
What were the three major paths to modernization in the
first half of the twentieth century, and why did they lead to
conflict?
The Soviet Path to Modernization. One aspect of the Soviet effort
to create an advanced industrial society was to collectivize agriculture,
which included a rapid mechanization of food production. Seen here are
peasants watching a new tractor at work.
c
Bettmann/CORBIS
634 CHAPTER 25 THE CRISIS DEEPENS: WORLD WAR II
Traditional habits of obedience and hierarchy, buttressed
by the concept of imperial divinity, were emphasized to
encourage citizens to sacrifice their resources, and some-
times their lives, for the national cause. The system cul-
minated in the final years of the war, when young Japanese
were encouraged to volunteer en masse to serve as pilots
in the suicide missions (known as kamikaze, ‘‘divine
wind’’) against U.S. battleships.
Women’s rights too were to be sacrificed to the
greater national cause. Already by 1937, Japanese women
were being exhorted to fulfill their patriotic duty by
bearing more children and by espousing the slogans of the
Greater Japanese Women’s Association. Japan was ex-
tremely reluctant to mobilize women on behalf of the war
effort, however. General Hideki Tojo, prime minister
from 1941 to 1944, opposed female employment, arguing
that ‘‘the weakening of the family system would be the
weakening of the nation. ... We are able to do our duties
only because we have wives and mothers at home.’’
9
Female employment increased during the war, but only in
areas where women traditionally worked, such as the
textile industry and farming. Instead of using women to
meet labor shortages, the Japanese government brought
in Korean and Chinese laborers.
The Frontline Civilians:
The Bombing of Cities
Bombing was used in World War II against a variety of
targets, including military targets, enemy troops, and
civilian populations. The bombing of civilians made
World War II as devastating for civilians as for frontline
soldiers. A small number of bombing raids in the last year
of World War I had given rise to the argument that public
outcry over the bombing of civilian populations would be
an effective way to coerce governments into making peace.
Consequently, European air forces began to develop long-
range bombers in the 1930s.
The first sustained use of civilian bombing contra-
dicted the theory. Beginning in early September 1940, the
German Luftwaffe subjected London and many other
British cities and towns to nightly air raids, making the
Blitz (as the British called the German air raids) a na-
tional experience. Londoners took the first heavy blows
but kept up their morale, setting the standard for the rest
of the British population (see the comparative illustration
on p. 636).
The British failed to learn from their own experi-
ence, however; Prime Minister Winston Churchill and
his adv isers believed that destroy ing German commu-
nities would break civ ilian morale and bring v ictory.
Major bombing raids began in 1942. On May 31, 1942,
Cologne became the first German city to be subjected to
an attack by a thousand bombers. Bombing raids added
an element of terror to circumstances a lready made
difficult by growing shortages of food, clothing, and
fuel. Germans especially feared incendiar y bombs,
which ignited firestorms that swept destructive paths
through the cities. The ferocious bombing of Dresden
from February 13 to 1 5, 1945, set off a f irestorm that
mayhavekilledasmanyas35,000inhabitantsand
refugees.
Germany suffered enormously from the Allied
bombi ng ra ids. Millions of buildings were destroyed,
and possibly half a million civilians died from the raids.
Nevertheless, it is highly unlikely that Allied bombi ng
sapped the morale of the German people. Instead
Germans, whether pro-Nazi or anti-Nazi, fought on
stubbornly, often driven simply by a desire to live. Nor
did the bo mbing destroy Germany’s industrial ca pacit y.
The Allied strategic bo mbing survey revealed t hat the
production of war mat
eriel actually increased between
1942 and 1944.
In Japan, the bombing of civilians reached a hor-
rendous new level with the use of the first atomic bomb.
Attacks on Japanese cities by the new American B-29
Superfortresses, the biggest bombers of the war, had be-
gun on November 24, 1944. By the summer of 1945,
many of Japan’s industries had been destroyed, along w ith
one-fourth of its dwellings. After the Japanese govern-
ment decreed the mobilization of all people between the
ages of thirteen and sixty into the so-called People’s
Volunteer Corps, President Truman and his advisers de-
cided that Japanese fanaticism might mean a million
American casualties, and Truman decided to drop the
newly developed atomic bomb on Hiroshima and
Nagasaki. The destruction was incredible. Of 76,000
buildings near the hypocenter of the explosion in Hi-
roshima, 70,000 were flattened, and 140,000 of the city’s
400,000 inhabitants had died by the end of 1945. Over the
next five years, another 50,000 perished from the effects
of radiation. The dropping of the atomic bomb on
Hiroshima on August 6, 1945, announced the dawn of the
nuclear age.
Aftermath of the War
Q
Focus Questions: What were the costs of World War II?
How did the Allies’ visions of the postwar differ , and
how did these differences contribute to the emergence
of the Cold War?
World War II was the most destructive war in history.
Much had been at stake. Nazi Germany followed a
worldview based on racial extermination and the
AFTERMATH OF THE WAR 635